Inhaling this gas could help treat Alzheimer’s disease, study suggests

A simple out-of-the-box treatment for Alzheimer’s disease has been discovered by scientists which could help activate brain cells that assist in breaking down plaques and reducing inflammation associated with the

neurodegenerative disease

.
A new mouse study published Wednesday in Science Translational Medicine shows that inhaling

xenon gas

can activate the brain’s immune cells called microglia, to break down plaques that are a hallmark of Alzheimer’s and reduce brain inflammation.

Considering the results are promising, the study is all set to enter its next leg by experimenting on humans and is set to begin this year.

Earlier Alzheimer’s drugs

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved two types of drugs to treat the symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease namely Cholinesterase inhibitors and NMDA antagonists. It has also given accelerated approval for aducanumab (Aduhelm). While three drugs have been approved, the treatments didn’t prove to be as effective as thought. Aduhelm was withdrawn from the market.

Treatment of Alzheimer’s has been concentrated on targeting

beta-amyloid plaques

that build up in the brain. Three drugs have been approved in recent years, but those treatments have not panned out to be as effective as researchers hoped, including one, Aduhelm, that was withdrawn from the market. Lately, researchers have started focusing on other targets, like microglia, as alternatives.

The new study “offers a ray of hope in this direction, providing a scaffold on which microglial-focusing clinical studies can hinge to offer a new approach to treatment,” said Ifeoluwa Awogbindin, a neuroimmunologist at the University of Victoria in Canada, who was not part of the new study.
Xenon has been used as an anesthetic and to treat brain damage that results from a lack of oxygen. Studies have also shown that xenon may protect neurons exposed to a toxic solution in mouse cell cultures.

How the study was conducted

A new study conducted by researchers from Washington University in St. Louis and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston has revealed that xenon gas can influence the behavior of microglia—immune cells found in the brain and spinal cord—using various mouse models representing different aspects of Alzheimer’s disease. In Alzheimer’s, microglia often lose their ability to break down beta-amyloid proteins, which accumulate between neurons and damage the brain. However, the study found that xenon helped microglia regain this function and also reduced the inflammation commonly associated with the disease.
In two mouse models exhibiting the hallmark proteins of Alzheimer’s – tau and beta-amyloid – exposure to xenon led to reduced levels of both proteins.
In mice with APOE4, a genetic variant that increases a person’s risk of Alzheimer’s, animals treated with xenon did better at tests of cognition and had less brain deterioration.

Thanks to the promising results, the researchers have got approval from the Food and Drug Administration and their institutional review boards to begin a Phase 1 trial to test the safety of the gas in healthy volunteers.
If this turns out as expected, the treatment of Alzheimer’s could be as simple as inhaling xenon gas.
Alzheimer’s disease is the leading cause of dementia, driven by a biological process that begins with the accumulation of amyloid plaques and neurofibrillary tangles in the brain. Over time, this buildup leads to the death of brain cells and a gradual shrinking of the brain.